Star Wars_ X-Wing 02_ Wedge's Gamble - Michael A. Stackpole [87]
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The peal of metal striking metal and the scream of the door being torn from its rails snapped Gavin’s head around to his right. Beyond Asyr he saw the door opposite the Imperial Fortress come crashing down, then a riderless speeder bike flew into the warehouse. Blaster bolts stippled the door and scarlet energy darts shot from incoming speeder bikes toward the stormtroopers.
As shock faded and the stormtroopers began to return fire, Gavin dove to the right and tackled Asyr Sei’lar. She snarled and clawed at his back as they went down, but he held on and rolled her toward the edge of the circle and behind debris. A dying Duros—his chest featuring a blackened hole at the center with flames burning around it—collapsed on top of them. Gavin shrugged him off and filled his hands with the blaster pistol the Duros had dropped.
Gavin came up on one knee and triggered two shots at a stormtrooper. One glanced off the man’s thigh armor, scoring it with a black stripe, and the other passed between the man’s knees. The stormtrooper came around, leveling his blaster carbine at Gavin. Oh, no, just like on Talasea.
A hand grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him down. The stormtrooper’s fire scythed up through where Gavin had been and one bolt passed through the hem of Gavin’s coat, but didn’t draw blood.
Having released her grip on his shoulder, Asyr leaned out around the ferrocrete blocks shielding them and snapped off two shots at the stormtrooper. Both hit him in the torso, turning him around and dropping him to the floor. There he twitched and slapped his hands at the holes in his armor, but he did not rise up again.
Red and green energy bolts crisscrossed in the air, filling the warehouse with the stink of ozone, melted armor, and burned flesh. The Fortress’s heavy blaster cannons pumped out bolts that methodically blasted into the lower levels of the makeshift dwellings. Shadowed interiors flared scarlet for a moment, then exploded in smoke and dust. The upper floors would collapse on the lower, burying people alive.
Gavin came up to fire again, but Asyr yanked him back down as a speeder bike just missed clipping him.
“Keep your head down unless you want to lose it.”
“A minute ago you were planning to have me killed.”
She flashed him a smile. “A bigot wouldn’t have saved me.”
Gavin shoved her aside with his left hand and triggered a line of shots at a stormtrooper peeking out from behind cover. “We can’t stay here.”
“C’mon, run to the open door.” Nimbly she rolled up onto her feet and started off. She scattered shots in the direction of the Fortress. He couldn’t see what she was shooting at because of the dust and the smoke, but he ran right along behind her and shot in the same direction she did. Blaster bolts sizzled back through the pall at him, but nothing came within a meter of hitting him.
As nearly as Gavin could tell, the volume of blaster fire heading in at the stormtroopers grossly exceeded the amount coming back from them. What the Imperial fire lacked in volume it made up for with accuracy and power. Through the smoke Gavin could see bolts from pistols and carbines glancing off the Fortress’s armor whereas its return fire stained the smoke with the color of blood and exploded whatever it touched. People ran screaming, others staggered and fell. He looked for anyone he could recognize, but saw none of the other Rogues among the refugees.
He reached the street outside and found himself abruptly dragged out of the river of fleeing people and to the left. He pulled his right arm free from the other man’s grasp, then smiled. “Corran?”